Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming all this way with Stoic :) THE BANNER SAGA IS NOW LIVE
Here's the launch trailer
Happy gaming! Backers can email community@stoicstudio.com if they need help getting their keys. Thank you again everyone!

In some games, you almost have to struggle to avoid romancing some NPCs.

Hahaha, DA2. I barely spoke to Merrill, and every time I did I castigated her for her idiot magic, but for some reason the game then auto-paired me with her and she disappeared in the sunset with me? I was so confused by that ending. Also never-mind the time I could only turn down Anders' advances by insulting him. EXCUSE ME. I have more tact than that. Damn dialogue wheel.

Hahaha, DA2. I barely spoke to Merrill, and every time I did I castigated her for her idiot magic, but for some reason the game then auto-paired me with her and she disappeared in the sunset with me? I was so confused by that ending. Also never-mind the time I could only turn down Anders' advances by insulting him. EXCUSE ME. I have more tact than that. Damn dialogue wheel.

Yeah, DA2 really messed up with that. Being able to romance characters is great, but if there is some tangible benefit that comes along with that, or a lot of game events are affected by it, there needs to be a benefit to choosing to stay single as well---otherwise you're forced to play your character a certain way to experience the game fully. Mass Effect 2's romance detector was a little oversensitive, as well, deciding that you'd been in a relationship with Ashley even if you'd only had a few friendly conversations.

Yeah, DA2 really messed up with that. Being able to romance characters is great, but if there is some tangible benefit that comes along with that, or a lot of game events are affected by it, there needs to be a benefit to choosing to stay single as well---otherwise you're forced to play your character a certain way to experience the game fully. Mass Effect 2's romance detector was a little oversensitive, as well, deciding that you'd been in a relationship with Ashley even if you'd only had a few friendly conversations.

That's why I took a save editor to my old ME1 clear save and made sure that the romance flag was OFF. I'd love for there to be a balancing element for choosing to remain single and dedicated to the task at hand in those kinds of games. Maybe now that Bioware is making a poll of opinions for DA3, I'll mention it when they begin talking systems (along with how the gameplay needs to improve, the enemies need to stop spawning from the air in the safe corner I've already fortified, etc etc a million things).

As it stands, I'm still trying to create a DA2 clear without Merrill in the mix. The best solution I've come up with has been to romance Isabelle instead. Sigh.

Arranging marriages would be a good touch, especially with the strong political overtones and undertones of the Banner Saga story. There definitely would need to be variety, of tribal creeds and beliefs that could clash. If you allow a marriage between a warrior from you clan and a girl from another, but her clan's beliefs crap all over the beliefs of your clan, that could lead to both clans being torn apart from the inside. At that point, it may be better to forbid the marriage for the sake of both your clans. Doing this in important so you don't develop Mass Effect/TOR Paragon syndrome, where you just keep clicking "1" for every single dialogue, knowing that the right thing will always happen because it is the "good" thing to do. No, that isn't how life works. Being too nice gets a dagger in your back or poison in your mug, especially in a grim world like we see in the Banner Saga.

And as odd as it sounds, marriage and romance could provide as a resource. Renown from sewing peace between clans, willpower boosts from the celebration, and perhaps a 5% change a Mender will be born from the union. Yes, people are resources. The bigger the Clan, the longer it survives, why do you think people in the ye olde days had as many kids as they bodies could handle?

You should make a decisions because you want to protect someone you love, not because you want to bang an alien

This made me laugh so hard.

There are a lot of good points in this thread. I have read a lot of fiction, watched a lot of movies and TV series and played a lot of roleplaying games (both computer and "real"). I also write stories and roleplaying games. In my experience (and opinion) it boils down to this: Any story in any medium is about the characters: how they develop and their relationships to each other. Everything else is window-dressing.

Obviously I am cutting it straight to the core. It does not mean that you cannot have awesome windowdressing in the shape of pretty graphics or special effects or a massively detailed background lore. But without a good plotline involving convincing characters and their emotions and relationships, all of that falls flat.

Arguably, part of almost any character development over a long time will inevitably include romance of some sort. So a storytelling game completely lacking thereof runs the risk of feeling like it is missing a vital component. That being said I would rather have romance missing than poorly done, as many of you have stated is the case with most big computer game titles today.

One of my absolute best experiences in computer game storytelling is Planescape: Torment. It made me forget my hatred for the D&D system and immersed me deeply into the plotlines, both the meta plot and the smaller plotlines involving the party members.

As for the gender debate, it is one of those subjects where there are very varied and often strong opinions. I am glad to see the debate has been civil here so far.

My own opinion is simple, I believe that man and woman are born biologically and emotionally different for the purpose of handling different tasks at an early stage in our evolution. Modern society reinforces these roles, often in a negative and exaggerated way which leads to unnecessary conflict. Modern society has also taken natural selection out of play which means we are not going to evolve in any way to adapt to this completely different society where our genes, brains and hormones very often work against us.